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1) The NEA Hotel: Where No One Ever
Gets a Wake Up Call. You can read a lot of teacher
union publications before you come across any humor. Tedium, yes. Belly
laughs, no. But an editorial in the January 2005 NEA Today did the
trick.
Addressing the post-election world, the
editorial is headlined "What Now?" Aha, I thought. Introspection! Then came
the sub-head: "The post-election bad news: budget woes, vouchers, and a
blurred line between church and state. The good news: A golden opportunity
to reshape the Republican Party."
Well, I've read dozens of election
post-mortems, but NEA is the only one to suggest that the results suggest a
golden opportunity to reshape the Republican Party. The article calls
on NEA Republicans to become more active in the GOP and swing it in the
NEA's direction "from the precinct level up." Meanwhile, NEA national
lobbyists will "push to maximize federal funding for public education,"
"seek funding needed to effectively implement NCLB requirements," and "work
to 'defund' vouchers for District of Columbia schools."
The NEA does come out in favor of tax
relief… for teachers. You can read the full article yourself at
http://www.nea.org/neatoday/0501/election.html.
What's missing from this fantasy is what
benefit the GOP is supposed to reap in exchange. What is the NEA sales
pitch? "Let us do for you what we've done for the Democrats?"
EIA is not yet in possession of NEA's
post-election polling, but it probably is not very different than the two
previous presidential campaigns. The Democrat gets a 90 percent endorsement
from the NEA convention delegates, he picks up 60 percent of the NEA vote,
and the education support professionals (ESPs) drift further into the GOP
column than the teachers. Considering the final outcome, NEA support was
probably substantial in places like Wisconsin, and disappointing in Florida.
There are certainly plenty of
Republicans willing to take NEA's PAC money, and vote for more federal
education spending. But NEA will continue to be marginalized in the
Republican Party for a reason so obvious it seems ridiculous to even write
it down: The union is wedded to the Democratic Party. The reason for this is
also obvious: The people who run the union are overwhelmingly Democrats, and
activist, liberal Democrats at that.
If NEA really wants to connect to
Republicans, it needs to take a cold hard look at itself, not at the GOP. It
could start with the folks responsible for Item #6 (see below). How many
Republicans in higher education will they persuade with that theme?
2) OWL RIP.
EIA first reported on OWL.org, NEA's web portal, in June 2000, and has
periodically updated its struggles since then. NEA's vision for OWL.org was
for it to become the virtual home for hundreds of thousands of members,
making it particularly suitable for mobilizing activists for political
action. But from the outset, NEA appeared to be behind the technology power
curve. As EIA asked in the November 6, 2000 communiqué: "NEA and AFT
Portals: Already Obsolete?" The AFT portal – MyAFT.org – disappeared in
August 2001, before NEA even launched OWL. Now, after millions of dollars
and countless staff hours, OWL.org meets a similar fate.
Earlier this year, the NEA Executive
Committee decided to revamp the NEA home page,
http://www.nea.org, to include the best elements of the old home page,
OWL, and Connect, the union's intranet site. Dubbed NEA Interactive, the new
site is schedule to debut in January 2005. Visitors to OWL will be
redirected to the NEA home page.
OWL was a costly dead duck from the
beginning. NEA Interactive is bound to be an improvement, but let's wait and
see.
3) Upset in Miami: Outsiders Win Top
Offices. In an amazing turnaround, United Teachers
of Dade (UTD) presidential candidate Karen Aronowitz turned a 19 percent
deficit in the first round of voting into a 52-48 percent victory in the
runoff. Aronowitz and her caucus won the top three union executive
positions.
Aronowitz defeated Shirley Johnson,
whose tenure as the UTD secretary-treasurer under Pat Tornillo was a key
issue in the campaign. Johnson and her caucus are challenging the election,
and have established a legal fund to file suit. "This election was tainted
by fraud," Johnson told the Miami Herald. "We are asking for a full
investigation."
Mark Richard, the AFT administrator of
UTD since Tornillo was deposed, seemed satisfied that the results were true
and accurate. He introduced Aronowitz and her slate to the Miami-Dade school
board and posted the election certification by TrueBallot, Inc., an election
services company from Bethesda, Maryland, on the UTD web site.
Barring fraud, an Aronowitz victory is a
positive outcome for teachers' unions across the country. Whatever kind of
president she turns out to be, she gives hope that, at least in extreme
circumstances, it is possible for members to clean house.
4) St. Louis Union and District Take
Drastic Measures. Members of the St. Louis
Teachers Union voted by a margin of 1,427-225 to authorize a strike.
Missouri law prohibits job actions by public employees.
Faced with a burgeoning crisis, the St.
Louis School Board took immediate action: it approved a $60,000 contract for
a new public relations consultant.
5) Education Journalism 101 Final
Exam. Read the following two summaries of local
education news stories:
Story #1: Two school bond issues
in Mustang, Oklahoma, were defeated. They received 55 percent and 54 percent
approval, respectively, but the law requires 60 percent approval. Just
before the election, a group of 40 to 100 parents protested the elimination
of a Nativity scene from the annual elementary school Christmas program.
Story #2: A local tax increase
for school funding in Medina County, Ohio, was defeated. The parent-teacher
organization (PTO) had refused to campaign in favor of the levy, citing
concerns that it would be in violation of IRS regulations. This month,
school administrators withdrew recognition of the PTO as a
district-supported organization.
Compare and contrast the two stories,
and explain why Story #1 is worthy of saturation national media coverage,
while Story #2 is not.
6) Call for Lefty Papers.
Ah, this next item brought back memories of graduate school in international
affairs…
Thought & Action, the NEA Journal of
Higher Education put out a call for papers on the topic of "The Role of
Public Higher Education in a National Security State." Here are a few
excerpts from the come-on:
* "In reaction to the attacks on
September 11, 2001, and in the rush to defend the nation against enemies
real and imagined, the United States has been reshaping itself in the image
of a national security state. Constitutional rights taken for granted in the
past have been redefined by a government that sees national security as the
focus of policy-making. Although the courts have recently begun to place
some limits on the power that can be exercised for this purpose, there has
been a serious curtailment of rights."
* "We are looking for manuscripts to
address the ominous questions that have emerged from these aforementioned
circumstances… Is higher education to become a support system for the
national security state?... How can faculty organize to make a difference in
what will otherwise occur if these trends continue?"
Manuscript guidelines are available at
http://www.nea.org/he/taguid.html and the deadline is February 15.
Articles are usually 5,000 words or less, so I guess this won't qualify
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0967799503/104-4840959-9181529?v=glance.
7) CQE Director to Join California
Stem Cell Panel. In the November elections,
California voters approved $3 billion in funding for embryonic stem cell
research. The new law required the appointment, by various state officials,
of 27 members to the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee. Those
appointees would then elect a chairman and vice chairman.
There has been some controversy over the
election of the chairman, who turned out to be Bob Klein. Klein is a real
estate developer with no scientific background who funded the initiative
campaign for stem cell research. The rest of the committee is what you might
expect: neurosurgeons, deans of medical schools, medical researchers,
officers of biopharmaceutical companies, et al. There are a few non-medical
people: a San Francisco deputy city attorney, the CEO of Paramount Pictures,
the wife of former Gov. Pete Wilson, and Communities for Quality Education (CQE)
executive director John Hein.
Hein has been running the NEA-created
501(c)(4) organization since its creation (see
March 29, 2004 EIA Communiqué). Before taking that position he
was in charge of governmental relations for the California Teachers
Association.
Hein was picked for the panel by
Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez. With the election over, evidently Hein's
duties at CQE won't be too demanding.
8) Irony on 34th Street.
The December 17 News Journal of Wilmington, Delaware, contained a
story about a program that brings middle school kids to the county
courthouse to watch lawyers and judges reenact the courtroom scene from
the1947 film classic "Miracle on 34th Street." For those very few
of you who haven't seen the film (first of all, shame on you!), the
climactic scene shows Santa Claus undergoing a mental competency hearing in
New York State Supreme Court.
"I thought it was a fantastic
opportunity for young people to see and experience what court was like,"
said Dan Slipetsky, who portrays Santa.
Now, don't get me wrong. I think this
program is a wonderful idea, and teaches children about the court system in
an interesting and non-threatening way. But I find it a funny way to
demonstrate how things work in the judicial system, considering what
actually happens in the movie.
At one point in the film, Judge Henry X.
Harper (played by Gene Lockhart) is asked to make a ruling on the existence
of Santa Claus. He orders a recess to consider the matter, and waiting in
his chambers is his political adviser, Charles Halloran (played by William
Frawley). Judge Harper tells Halloran he is going to rule that Santa doesn't
exist, and Halloran delivers this wonderful speech:
"All right, you go back and tell them
that the New York State Supreme Court rules there's no Santa Claus. It's all
over the papers. The kids read it and they don't hang up their stockings.
Now what happens to all the toys that are supposed to be in those stockings?
Nobody buys them. The toy manufacturers are going to like that; so they have
to lay off a lot of their employees – union employees. Now you got the CIO
and the AF of L against you and they're going to adore you for it and
they're going to say it with votes. Oh, and the department stores are going
to love you, too, and the Christmas card makers and the candy companies. Ho,
ho, Henry, you're going to be an awful popular fella. And what about the
Salvation Army? Why, they got a Santa Claus on every corner, and they're
taking in a fortune. But you go ahead, Henry, you do it your way. You go on
back in there and tell them that you rule there is no Santy Claus. Go on.
But if you do, remember this: you can count on getting just two votes, your
own and that district attorney's out there."
To which Judge Harper replies: "The
district attorney's a Republican."
Now there's a civics lesson for the
kids!
9) Scheduling Note.
There will be no communiqué next week. EIA wishes each of you a very Merry
Christmas and a joyous New Year. The next issue of the EIA Communiqué
will appear on Monday, January 3.
10) Quote of the Week.
"It was also reported that the website had been visited 25
times prior to this meeting according to the hit counter. Someone is
checking the site." – from the December 2004 minutes of the Indian River
Education Association (Delaware) representative assembly. EIA only checks it
once a week, but glad to contribute. |
